May 2010

Intelligencer - Caught Redhanded

Like secret agents keeping valuable documents in briefcases handcuffed to their wrists, women can keep the contents of their purses (i.e., charge cards, lipstick, mace) especially close at hand with Redhanded’s Handcuff Clutch.

PSST - Word Association May 2010

DeAnn Lubell of Rancho Mirage has published a historical novel titled The Last Moon (XLibris), based on the 1902 eruption of Mt. Pelée on the island of Martinique. The saga — replete with forbidden love, corruption, mass murder, bravery, sacrifice, survival, and hope.

PSST - Cameo

Janice Kleinschmidt

Coachella Valley’s certified sake sommelier surprises -—- not only because at only 26 years of age and Turkish he is the head sushi chef at Renaissance Esmeralda Resort in Indian Wells, but also because he’ll tell you the worst thing you can do to quality sake is serve it hot.

A Star Turn

BY ROBERT JULIAN

A case of wine, each bottle chosen from a different vintner, greeted architect Joseph Ambrose when he arrived home after his first meeting with Rod Stewart. “The attached note said he hoped the gift would inspire me to give special attention to his project,” Ambrose recalls of the 1986 meeting.

Bionic Houses - Little Tuscany House

BY NICOLE BORGENICHT

Lance O’Donnell designed and built his family’s house at 2299 N. Via Monte Vista in Palm Springs using the power of the great outdoors as a “timeless, low-tech solution” for cross-ventilation.

Bionic Houses - Smoke Tree House

BY NICOLE BORGENICHT

Architect Suzanne Zahr Fleming, who designed a house on Smoke Tree Lane in Palm Springs, suggests going green simply means good design. “The most effective way to promote energy efficiency is to design a house that takes full advantage of natural light, passive solar energy, shading, cross-ventilation, and efficient space planning,” she says.

Bionic Houses - Pioneertown House

BY NICOLE BORGENICHT

Lloyd Russell, architect for the “green” house on Burns Canyon Road in Pioneertown, refers to his “handmade modernism”: sharp design and better, affordable construction. The architecture features sleek lines and sundry materials that enhance the structure and lifestyle.

Editors Letter for May 2010

BY STEVEN BILLER

As this issue goes to press, a new housing report aired on NPR indicating that home prices had inched up about three-tenths of a point, continuing a slow but steady trend that may signal market stabilization.

Horoscope - May 2010

BY SHERRYL NOVA

Born at dawn? Your ascendant matches your sun sign, making you a double Taurus (or whatever your sign). Also born on the new moon (a possibility of four hours over two days of each month), you are a triple. Most of us are a mixed bag of signs and elements. Our chart, like the iris of our eye or fingerprint, is unique to each one of us.

Wealth - May 2010

BY ELLEN PARIS

Rita Pacheco often travels between La Quinta and her 5,000-square-foot oceanfront home on the Mexican Riviera in Mazatlan. “I go every other month and stay for a month. Between my computer and Skype, I can do business from there,” says Pacheco, who manages vacation properties she owns in the desert. She says her five children thought she had flipped out when she announced she was building a home in Mexico.

What Your Money Buys Now

BY ELLEN PARIS

With house prices down 30 to 50 percent across the Coachella Valley and in Palm Springs, savvy buyers with hard cash and platinum credit have been snapping up prime properties that were likely beyond their price range four years ago. Calgary car dealer Gary Sartorio and his wife, Barbara, for example, scored a great deal at Mirada in Rancho Mirage.

PSST - Chocolate Lovers Indulge With Oprah!

BY JANICE KLEINSCHMIDT

At the end of her Feb. 22 show, Oprah Winfrey invited audience members to come on stage and walk off with pieces of the set. It wasn’t the icon’s early exit from network television to cable (scheduled for 2011), but rather her largesse in fulfilling chocolate-lovers’ dreams. And it eased deconstruction for set creators Larry Abel (shown on right) and Raymond McCallister, owners of A•S•I in Hollywood and Palm Springs.